Mindful Living

I recently read an article in Psychology Today that helped to clarify my views on self esteem. One of the goals for people who come to therapy often is to "improve self esteem", and to be honest, as clinicians we don't always consciously know the right recipe to help with that- but fortunately, we intuitively know what to do. If someone has "contingent self esteem" (a feeling of self worth based upon outside validation), then we become puppets- happy or sad depending upon what is happening outside of us and who/what is validating us, or not validating us at the moment. For example, you are single and a few people are interested in you- boom! You feel great, but then take away the attention, and you feel down again. This often causes us to feel like yoyos and never have firm ground to stand on. The way to authentic self esteem is compassion. Treat yourself gently , especially when you make mistakes. Know that you will be crabby, you will say the wrong thing, you

Happy New Year! Clinic News: Things are well at the clinic. I am so fortunate to have a job that I love- when I got back from our anniversary trip, I was very excited to get back to seeing clients! We have some good news about insurance: we WILL continue to be in the Humana network for 2012. Previously I had told our clients that we would not be in the network, but we were able to work things out. Tricia Schutz wrote an article on parenting for this newsletter- she is the mother of 2 young girls. I have not made any resolutions for 2012, except I will continue with Pilates; it's helped my aches and pains enormously, and I brought a yoga mat to the clinic so that I can do some stretching during downtime. Now that the holidays are done, focus on caring for yourself and your needs- sleep well, move your body, eat foods that are satisfying, and do something creative (write, draw, paint, sing, dance). Til next time, be gentle with yourself and others. Devona Marshall, clini

I just watched it, and it hangs around for a while. It keeps coming back to me and making me think about it from different angles.